Walk to lead writing program

Kerry Walk

Princeton NJ -- Kerry Walk has been selected as director of
the new Princeton Writing Program.

Walk will come to the University this summer after eight
years as a writing program administrator and prize-winning
teacher at Harvard University, where she currently serves as
assistant director of the Harvard Writing Project, an
innovative writing-in-the-disciplines program. She helps
departments develop second-level writing intensive courses,
trains graduate student instructors, and writes and
disseminates pedagogical materials.

Walk is also a senior preceptor in the Expository Writing
Program, with duties that include recruiting, mentoring and
training teachers in the program, developing curriculum,
maintaining the program Web sites and teaching freshman
writing. Prior to assuming her current responsibilities, she
served as director of writing programs in Harvard's Division
of Continuing Education.

"In orientations, retreats and workshops on the teaching
of writing at Harvard and other institutions, Dr. Walk has
helped hundreds of faculty rethink their course design by
placing writing at the center of the enterprise and
organizing readings around writing assignments," wrote Nancy
Weiss Malkiel, dean of the college, in a recent memo to
faculty and administrators.

Walk's book, "Commenting & Grading: A Guide for
College Teachers," will be published this year.

Walk had her first experiences as a writing teacher and
program coordinator at the University of
California-Berkeley, where she earned her Ph.D. in English
literature. She holds a B.A. from Wellesley College.

The new Princeton Writing Program, approved by the
faculty in December, will allow freshmen to satisfy the
University writing requirement by enrolling in seminars of
12 students. The program will offer nearly 100 topic-based
writing seminars that will be taught by faculty members,
administrators with appropriate academic credentials,
post-enrolled graduate students, scholars on post-doctoral
appointments and lecturers appointed to the faculty to teach
full time in the writing program.

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